


Bitter Pill

by NanakiBH



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Bad Ending, Exhaustion, Humiliation, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Mind Games, Post-Break Up, Some Plot, Teasing, Tickling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 21:52:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14411307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NanakiBH/pseuds/NanakiBH
Summary: Hinata wanted to make him understand.





	Bitter Pill

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AngelBoy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngelBoy/gifts).



> This fic is for AngelBoy who requested a post-break up fic where Hinata gets some revenge on Komaeda with tickling. It's a little dark, so be mindful of the tags.
> 
> It's pretty different from my usual, so I'm curious what other people think. If you read, please leave a comment with your thoughts!

At age seventeen, Hinata Hajime experienced his first breakup.

It was nothing. That was what he told himself. He kept telling himself that as if it would help convince him. Although it seemed like the obvious course for things to take, there was a voice at the back of his mind that kept questioning whether that was true. He hated that part of himself. He wished that it would just leave him alone and be quiet. What he did was for the best, and that was just how things were supposed to be.

 

From the beginning, it was a relationship that never should have happened.

 

Hinata wasn't an extraordinary person. In pretty much every way, he was ordinary and unexceptional. It helped him coast through life, moving from one day to the next in an average way. Compared to him, his friends were all better students – all of them smarter and more talented. Watching the way they worked hard and struggled to continue being 'special' made him almost feel like there was nothing special about it. But he was jealous.

The teachers acted surprised that the top honors students wanted to hang out with him. Hinata didn't think it was that surprising, though. He understood why they gave him their attention.

They were better than him.

He was someone easy for them to push around. It wasn't great – he knew that. They were taking advantage of him, but it was alright. No matter what he did, he knew that he would never be able to become like them. He'd made it to high school without ever figuring out whether or not he had something that made him unique. As time drew on, he started to give up on the idea of figuring it out. He had no passions that could propel him forward like they did. His friends' lives were difficult, but he envied their ambition the attention they received.

Being their friend made him special.

Whenever he was with them, he noticed the envious looks in the eyes of his other classmates. They couldn't understand how someone as ordinary as him could have ended up with such an acclaimed group of friends. He wasn't oblivious to the sort of talk that occurred behind his back. Sometimes, they didn't even bother to hide the way they felt about him. His classmates resented him.

Sometimes, he came to school and found used tissues stuffed in his locker. Sometimes, his homework was stolen off of his desk while he wasn't looking.

Speaking up for himself was pointless... But that was what he had his friends for.

Whenever his jealous classmates decided to pick on him, rather than taking the issue to a worthless teacher, Hinata just had to mention it to one of his friends. The second they stood up and said something to defend him, the rest of the class would fall silent, ashamed for having disappointed the ones they admired. That disappointment always inevitably lead to more resentment, however. It was a stupid cycle.

That much was worth it. He could handle it. It was easy for him to take it in stride when he knew that he was the one in the right. Their jealous feelings were their own responsibility.

He just wished that they'd leave him alone...

It was pointless. Hinata couldn't understand what they were getting out of it. Was there some sort of sense of satisfaction they found in tormenting him that way?

It wasn't that bad... Really, it was alright. It was just one small thing, here and there. He could barely call it 'bullying'. He really didn't want to call it that, so he couldn't talk to the teachers or the guidance counselor about it, and he knew how pointless that would have been, anyway. The adults around him only cared about the exceptional students. And even then, the adults only cared about them as long as they were making the school look good.

Still...

Nothing in life could be as easy as he wanted it to be.

He just wanted a friend who wouldn't look down on him. He wanted someone he could trust with his feelings and share his problems with. He wanted someone who respected him and saw something special in him when no one else would.

There was no one like that. There shouldn't have been anyone like that.

 

Except, there was him – Komaeda Nagito.

 

For the longest time, Hinata tried to ignore him. When he first noticed him looking in his direction, he got a bad feeling, like some kind of omen.

He'd heard things about Komaeda. He was a transfer student. The day he came to their school, the air conditioning broke and everyone had to suffer and try to stay focused through the biggest heatwave of the summer. A whole ton of other bad things started happening around their school ever since he transferred there. The water fountains would jam, students who partnered with him for projects would fall ill, severe weather would prevent any of them from leaving and going home... It seemed impossible to blame that all on one person, but the circumstances were too unusual to be brushed off as a coincidence.

Even Komaeda himself freely admitted that he was bad luck. Hinata didn't know a lot about him, but he knew that he was alone. No one ever saw or heard about his parents.

In a way, that made him mysterious. And mystery led to intrigue.

Before his rational side could stop him, Hinata was fascinated. He wanted to know more about that strange, cursed boy. There was no way that the curse could be real, but he wanted to find out for himself if the rumors were true.

So, he tried to observe him while maintaining his distance. He hated Komaeda's attention. Feeling his eyes on him always sent shivers down his spine, like simply being stared at would be enough to incur the wrath of Komaeda's bad luck. That didn't seem like it could be possible, but then strange things started happening around him.

One day, his phone started ringing in class even though he was sure he had the sound turned off. The teacher confiscated it and he had to humiliate himself by asking his parents to speak to the teacher to help him get it back. Not only did the teacher look down on him for that incident, his parents also started to doubt whether he was responsible enough to keep a cellphone on him at school. From then on, he kept checking it before class to make sure the sound was off.

His gym clothes went missing after that. He was sure that he'd brought them with him to school, but they weren't where they were supposed to be. At first, he suspected that it was one of his other classmates. The phone incident could have been their doing, too.

He went to his friends and told them about the strange things that were happening to him, but they didn't help him immediately like they usually would have. Instead, they asked him if he was sure he hadn't misplaced his gym clothes himself. They'd never doubted him like that before...

Eventually, his friends confronted the other students in their class about his gym clothes, but no one admitted to stealing them. It was like they had just disappeared into thin air...

Hinata couldn't stand the feeling of paranoia it gave him. Every day, he expected something new to happen, and he started internally blaming their new classmate for it. Even the way his friends had started looking at him and doubting him... It was probably because of Komaeda's attention.

Unfortunately, his bad luck didn't end there.

They were assigned a project and he and Komaeda had to work on it together as partners. After he'd been doing his best to keep his distance, it was like Komaeda's bad luck had wrapped itself around him like a rope and spitefully pulled him closer. As soon as they were given the assignment, he was tempted to ask the teacher if he could be paired with anyone else, but he didn't want to sound rude. After all, Komaeda was still new at that point... He was still adjusting... Even if they were different, Hinata felt like he could relate to the way he was ostracized.

He _had_ wanted to know more about him... So he treated that project as his opportunity.

Over the course of working on the project together, he finally learned more about the enigmatic transfer student. As it turned out, he had a pretty tough life. Extremely tough. When he compared the two of them, Hinata felt bad for ever thinking that their situations were similar. Even if he was average, living a joyless day-to-day life, he had parents who took care of him and provided for him – Komaeda didn't even have that much.

From a young age, he said, he'd always been plagued with what seemed to be bad luck. No matter how many times Komaeda stressed how real it was, Hinata stayed skeptical. It sounded too supernatural to be real. In his ordinary, boring life, people with supernatural powers couldn't exist, even if their 'powers' were good for nothing.

He convinced himself that Komaeda was just an average student like him. The only difference was that things were even worse for Komaeda.

For the most part, he was quiet and respectful, but there were times when he stepped over boundaries. His behavior left Hinata feeling a little confused and wary of him. Watching him attempting and failing to befriend their classmates gave him secondhand embarrassment at times.

Overall, he just... felt bad for him.

Maybe that was how his own friends felt about him. He liked being around Komaeda because his patheticness gave him a sense of superiority.

Before long, he started to realize that he liked being around Komaeda.

That was how it started. Even though he realized how awful those feelings were, he couldn't help it, and he thought that things might change. After completing the project with him, Komaeda continued to follow him around as if they were friends. As long as they were together, Hinata noticed that he rarely experienced any unusually bad luck, but he was still reluctant to accept it as something supernatural. Rather than trying to get rid of him, he decided to let Komaeda stay.

Somehow, they ended up as more than friends.

Looking back, Hinata couldn't even explain to himself how it happened. It might've just been an impulse. He could tell that Komaeda had special feelings for him, and he was hungry for attention from anyone... He thought that his friends would respect him more if he had the unlikable transfer student trapped under his foot, but... Things didn't turn out like he expected.

No one respected him more. In fact, things got worse.

He was picked on more frequently and his friends started distancing themselves. The one thing that made him seem special and important started slipping away because he took a chance on someone pathetic and talentless.

He should've known better. In some ways, they really _were_ alike – but not in good ways. Being together with Komaeda wasn't going to improve anything about his high school life. It only made it harder. If no one liked Komaeda, then they weren't going to like him by association.

That was the cruel truth of things. All the time, Hinata wondered if things would have been different for them if they weren't in high school with others watching them.

It couldn't keep going like that. It was too hard to imagine a future with them together and the idea of spending another year together under that kind of scrutiny was too much for Hinata to bear.

 

So he ended it.

 

It wasn't as difficult as he expected it to be. That kind of made it worse. He felt like the bad guy.

Komaeda had just looked at him with that look of his... He wondered if Komaeda knew how it made him feel and if he did it on purpose. There was half of a smile, but there was no happiness in it. Komaeda said he was fine – that he expected him to get tired of him eventually – and he told him not to worry about it.

Hinata hated that. He felt guilty even though he hadn't done anything wrong.

Komaeda seemed like he could have been that perfect friend he'd always wanted, but the world they lived in made it impossible for them to be together. They were always going to be judged for who they were, and Hinata couldn't be happy with that.

 

Once it was over, he hoped that things would go back to being the way they were before they knew each other. He wanted to go to school, see his friends, and be ordinary, but things couldn't be that simple. No one forgot about the fact that he'd been together with Komaeda. Even if he broke up with him, classmates continued to pester and tease him about it. They asked him disturbingly personal questions about him on the regular.

He'd only been with Komaeda for a short time, but he felt like he'd learned a lot about him in that time. Being equally desperate for attention, Komaeda had opened up to him like a book, telling him more than he asked and more than he even cared to know. If he were a cruel person, Hinata knew enough about him to blackmail him for the rest of his life. Whenever other students asked him about him, Hinata kept to himself and didn't respond to them, but he always had an answer.

It was over and done with, but he got the feeling that Komaeda was still holding on to hope that he would change his mind. Hinata was pretty sure that something like that would never happen. With the way things were, it wasn't a good idea for either of them.

Didn't he understand that? Was he stupid?

Hinata didn't know what to make of him. He couldn't wrap his head around the way Komaeda thought. He had no reason to be so hopeful. Things were just going to be harder for him if he kept acting that way.

Thankfully, he hadn't lost his friends. They were definitely judging him for having gone near Komaeda, though. They didn't defend him anymore like they used to. They rarely talked to him about it, but it was like they were silently punishing him for associating with him.

It wasn't fair. It didn't make sense. Komaeda was beneath everyone, even him.

Resentment started to take hold of him. It made him wish that he could make Komaeda go down even lower, forcing him below the bottom to a place where no one would think about him or even remember him. His arrival at their school was ruining everything, and his presence always made things worse. Everyone would have been better off without him.

If Komaeda kept trying to get back together with him, then he was going to have to do something to make him get lost. He had to make him understand.

 

For the first time in forever, Soda, Tanaka, and Kuzuryu invited him out.

 

Finally! It felt like so long since he'd done something together with his friends outside of school. Hinata was starting to get worried that they were giving him the cold shoulder. He half-expected them to totally stop talking to him without explanation. Despite how much time they spent around each other at school, they could be very secretive about their real feelings. Their frequent silence always magnified his paranoid feelings.

They were going to Destiny Land, Tokyo's biggest theme park. The place was huge and there were so many things for them to do. There were rides, games, and even a water park. He was so excited!

And yet... He was also unexplainably nervous. That paranoid feeling started creeping up on him again as he prepared to meet them.

It had to be nothing. It was Komaeda's fault that he started feeling like that to begin with. It was time for him to forget about him and move on.

 

He went to the park on his own and met up with the others at the gate.

The sky was clear. The sun was shining. He didn't have anything to worry about.

But then a familiar, ominous shiver went down his spine. They hadn't even made it inside the park yet. When he turned around, he spotted the last person he wanted to see there.

It just figured that Komaeda would show up.

Hinata prayed that he would be able to ignore him, but the others noticed him, too. As soon as Komaeda saw them looking toward him, he ran over, holding a park ticket in his hand.

“Hinata-kun!”

Hinata couldn't understand how he could still look and sound so cheerful when he saw him. They broke up. Didn't he know what that meant? Why did he think it was alright for him to still talk to him? He never said anything about staying friends. He just wanted his space.

“Hey! Wow, fancy meeting you guys here!” Komaeda said, smiling from ear to ear. “What a lucky meeting. Normally, I avoid these kinds of places because I never know what might happened, but I happened to win these tickets from the school raffle. I didn't have anyone to go with me, but now I don't feel so bad about that with you guys here.”

The other guys looked at each other, then they collectively turned to stare at Hinata. It was obvious that they expected him to say something.

Hinata cleared his throat and tried to be as straightforward as he could be without sounding rude. “We, uh... We already have our own plan laid out. Sorry, it doesn't involve an extra person.”

“Oh...” Somehow, it actually seemed like he took the hint. His smile fell slightly, but he tried to keep it up. “That's alright. I know I'm not easy to be around, especially after-... Well. It's fine. Never mind. It was nice seeing you. I hope nothing bad happens with me here.”

That was a problem. Knowing Komaeda's luck, he and his friends would probably die in some kind of freak roller coaster accident. Hinata wished that Komaeda had picked a different day – or he wished that he would just leave. But... He did recall being unaffected by his luck as long as they were together...

“Hey, it's no problem,” Soda said. He put a hand on Hinata's shoulder and grinned at Komaeda. “You can join us for a bit. We can change our schedule up a little to accommodate you. I think Hinata would enjoy that, too – wouldn't you, Hinata?” He turned and directed his grin at Hinata.

He was obviously planning something.

“S-Sure. If you say so,” Hinata muttered, though he had no idea what Soda was thinking.

Soda let him go and started walking into the park. Hinata and the other guys followed after him and Komaeda also joined them after a moment's hesitation.

“I'm surprised he agreed,” Komaeda said quietly, just for Hinata to hear.

Was his bad luck already at work? It was hard to figure out what Soda had up his sleeve. Hinata watched him as he kept walking ahead of them, as he leaned over to Tanaka and Kuzuryu and quietly muttered something to them. Whatever it was, Hinata felt like he was being left out of the loop. That was supposed to be his day to clear the air with them... They were already ignoring him.

 

They stopped outside of the haunted house attraction.

 

Hinata had never been to the park before, but he'd heard about their haunted house. It was there all year and regularly changed themes. It looked like their current theme was a crime scene. From the outside, screams and groans of pain could be heard. It was probably just a recording, but it sounded real enough to be the screams of other park attendees.

“I see. Nothing could go wrong here,” Tanaka said thoughtfully, holding a hand to his chin.

Kuzuryu nodded, looking excited. “Yeah, this makes sense. No matter how unlucky this guy is, nothing bad could happen here because everything's scripted. Nice thinking, Soda. You can actually be smart sometimes.”

“Aw, thanks,” Soda said, pretending to be flattered. “The poor guy has no friends, right? I figure, we could show him a good time.”

Hinata finally realized what they were thinking when he took a glance at Komaeda. He looked absolutely terrified. Just by looking at him, he could tell that he didn't want to step one foot in the attraction, but he was also too reluctant to admit it, wanting to seem brave in front of his classmates. If he braved his way through the attraction, he probably thought that they would get closer to each other, but Hinata knew that it couldn't be that easy. They saw it as an opportunity to mess with him.

That was pretty awful of them, but Hinata couldn't speak up about it, either. He'd been wanting Komaeda off his back for a while. He knew that Komaeda meant well, but his tenacity was too much to take. He had to shake him off somehow, but he couldn't bring himself to do it on his own.

“It'll be fine,” Hinata said. He nodded at the guys and held out a hand for Komaeda. “If anything bad happens, I'll be with you. You don't have to worry.”

Komaeda looked surprised at first, but he eagerly reached out and took his hand.

The wait wasn't long. They went in almost immediately. The other three went in first and Hinata followed, still holding Komaeda's hand.

The inside of the attraction wasn't very spooky. It had a dark, dungeon-like atmosphere. It smelled like cement and the chemicals from the fog machines. There was fake blood on the ground, barely visible in the limited light. As they passed through a chain-link gate, they stepped into a room filled with flickering monitors and a station covered with buttons that were probably used to control them.

Soda pointed up at one of the monitors. “Whoa, look at that one! That's totally us!”

“So we can see,” Tanaka said, looking less impressed. “It isn't magic. There are cameras watching us.”

Kuzuryu approached the controls and started looking over them carefully, trying to determine which button corresponded to each screen. Soda cracked his knuckles and took it upon himself to investigate with a hands-on approach. “Step aside. This is my specialty. Half of these buttons have to be fake, so you have to focus on the ones that stand out. I bet this red one will do something.”

Before any of them could tell him not to, Soda pressed the button.

There was a disconcerting hissing noise, and then the floor shook. Hinata looked down right as a hatch in the floor slid apart underneath Komaeda's feet. Before he could react, Komaeda fell, and Hinata fell along with him, still holding his hand.

“Guys! Help!”

He groaned and tried to pull Komaeda up, but he was surprisingly heavy. The floor underneath them was too dark, so he couldn't tell how far down it went. If he let go of Komaeda, he didn't know if he would be alright. They had to help him pull him up.

“Guys?”

The three others stood around him.

Soda tapped his foot, arms crossed over his chest. “Yeah, hey... Hinata... I think it would be best for you two to spend some time alone. Try to help him understand that we don't want a creepy guy like him hanging out with us. That means you, too. You wanna be better than him, don't you?”

Hinata didn't like what he was implying.

Instead of helping, the other three pushed him toward the edge and let him fall down along with Komaeda.

 

He hit the ground, but his fall was cushioned with Komaeda underneath him.

The area around them was dark. He couldn't see anything. He heard Komaeda groaning, so at least he knew that he was alright, more or less.

“This is... actually pretty creepy,” Hinata muttered.

“We need to find the lights,” Komaeda said, pushing himself up.

“You don't sound very bothered by this. You were expecting something like this to happen, weren't you?”

He sighed sadly. “Pretty much. I was really glad that you let me hold your hand, but I knew that it was going to make something bad happen. I'm not allowed to be that happy. You know how it is.”

Yeah. He knew how it was. He wished he didn't.

“Anyway, just... Help me look for the lights,” Hinata said. He also got up and started feeling his way around the room, being careful of his step. It was creepy enough being in the dark basement of a theme park attraction, but it was even worse with Komaeda there. In the dark, he got the feeling like anything could happen. He could still hear shouts and cries of agony, dampened by the walls and the floor above them. “I wonder if we're even supposed to be here... This doesn't seem right. Why are the lights off? Are we alone, or...”

The thought that they weren't really alone was enough to make him break out in a cold sweat. The attraction was just an attraction. It was all fake. Even if there _was_ someone else there, they were probably a park attendant in costume.

“This is your fault,” he said under his breath. “If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have gotten separated from them-”

There was a loud, metal noise. It sounded like something opening and then snapping into place. Komaeda let out a sound when it happened, too, but he didn't sound surprised. Once again, he must have been expecting something bad to happen. It was always one thing after another.

“I think I'm stuck.”

“What do you mean? Keep looking for the lights.”

“Um, didn't you hear me? I'm stuck. I can't move. Something seems to be holding me in place. You're going to have to find the lights without me. Sorry...”

An irritated sigh slipped past Hinata's lips. “You're seriously worthless, aren't you?” He shook his head, trying not to get too annoyed with him. “Whatever. Just stay where you are and try not to have anything else go wrong, okay? I'll find them on my own. I'm sure they're around here somewhere.”

Carefully moving in a straight line, Hinata reached the wall and began feeling around at chest-height. Eventually, as he moved closer to where Komaeda had gotten himself stuck, he felt something like a control panel covered in buttons. If he pressed the wrong one, he feared falling through another trap, but he was just going to have to risk it.

He gave one of the buttons a tap and the lights turned on.

They weren't very bright, but they were sufficient.

The room they were in looked like a madman's torture chamber. Numerous devices for restraining and tormenting victims were littered about, covered in blood and rust. It definitely looked like it was still part of the attraction, but it was just so quiet. They were alone.

“Hm. Maybe they closed down this part of the attraction?” Komaeda said. “These things look old. I bet we aren't supposed to be here. Hurry up and get me free so we can get out of here, Hinata-kun.”

Hinata finally took a look at what Komaeda had gotten himself into.

It wasn't the worst of the devices in the chamber, but it was still pretty bad. “How the heck did you get caught in this?” he asked, squinting at him in disbelief.

It was a modern pillory. Komaeda stood slightly bent over at it with his head through the hole in the middle, his hands trapped on the sides. For someone who was trapped in a medieval-style punishment device, he didn't look too uncomfortable. He looked up at Hinata from the corners of his eyes, grinned warily, and waved his hands around.

“Haha... Photo op!” he said, making peace signs with both hands. “That's one of the essential theme park experiences, isn't it?”

Hinata laughed and took out his phone. “You're right. This ought to be a good picture. Say cheese.”

He snapped the picture before Komaeda had the chance to say anything.

“I-I wasn't being serious, but alright... Just don't share that with anyone, okay? I bet I look awfully embarrassing right now.”

“You really do,” Hinata agreed.

It wasn't a bad look for him, actually, though Hinata didn't want to admit that out loud. He kind of liked seeing Komaeda looking helpless. The longer he stood there watching him, the more uncomfortable Komaeda seemed to become. He tested the restraints but wasn't able to pull his hands free from the holes. When he tried to pull his head out, he groaned when the back of his head hit the metal pallet behind him.

Eventually, he stopped struggling and stared at the dusty floor. “Hey... Um. I already told you how happy I was that you held my hand, but I just wanted to say thanks, too. You didn't have to do that. I know that the other guys don't like me... I heard what they were saying when you and I were hanging from the ceiling. I... I get the idea.”

That seemed too easy.

“Really?” Hinata asked. “To be honest, I'm not sure you do. Look, we're alone right now, so I can tell you what I think. The thing is... Everything's been harder since you transferred to our school. You can't just show up and expect everyone to like you.”

“It's not like that...”

It was definitely like that. Komaeda never learned his lesson, no matter how many times he was kicked around by the other students. He always got back up and tried to be their friend. It was irritating. It was frustrating.

Hinata didn't know what to do about him.

His eyes searched the room as if looking for the answer. Then they fell upon something interesting.

As Komaeda curiously asked what he was doing, Hinata walked across the room to a metal cart filled with torture implements. It seemed to have everything, even scalpels, needles, and other dangerous-looking items. He picked up one of the knives where Komaeda could see and ran his finger over the edge. He hissed as it scraped his finger and pulled it away before it could draw blood.

“It's actually sharp. That's nuts. Who would put these here? Park guests could hurt themselves on these things.”

“You shouldn't touch them. Just leave them alone. You don't know what will happen when I'm around,” Komaeda said.

“Actually...” Hinata narrowed his eyes mischievously, getting an idea. “As long as I stay near you, nothing bad seems to happen to me. The second we're away, that's when the bad things start. But why is that? I'm still experiencing bad luck because of you, even though we broke up... Is it because you can't stop thinking about me?”

Komaeda's face turned red. “Well... I mean... Yeah... Of course. I can't help it.”

“That's kind of cute, but you heard what they said.” He scanned the cart and found something that appealed to him. A Wartenberg wheel – a type of small, metal pinwheel used to test physical sensitivity. He made mental note of it. He didn't want to scare Komaeda with that yet.

“So... What does that mean?” Komaeda asked, looking a little pale. “I know you, Hinata-kun. You've always been really nice to me. You don't have to do anything that makes you uncomfortable because of them. Real friends wouldn't make you do something you don't want to do. Right?”

“You make it sound like they forced me to break up with you.” He returned to where Komaeda was and looked down at him. He opened the picture of him on his phone and turned it around for him to see. “Look at you. You look totally helpless and pathetic. That's what other people see when they look at you. Nobody wants a friend like that. They'd rather hang out with someone who can take care of themselves, who doesn't cause so much trouble. You weren't even doing anything, and you managed to get yourself into a situation like this. Are you clumsy or just stupid?”

“It's my luck,” Komaeda insisted. “I know you don't want to believe me...”

“I don't know whether I can believe in your luck or not. All I know is that it all comes back to you. All of the strange incidents around the school that happened after you transferred... That one time when my phone started ringing... Even my missing gym clothes.” Suddenly, he felt like the puzzle pieces were aligning. “You have them, don't you?”

“H-Huh? What are you talking about?”

“My gym clothes. I should've realized it sooner... You were always watching me. You probably knew when I wouldn't be looking, then you took them. I kept ignoring you, but you wanted my attention, so you decided that if you couldn't have me, then you'd take something of mine instead. I'm right, aren't I? That's so creepy...”

Komaeda blinked rapidly and tried to struggle against the pillory. “I don't know what you're talking about. You're starting to worry me. I... I had nothing to do with that.”

His stuttering didn't make him sound convincing.

“No way... You really are a pervert, just like they said.”

“I'm not!” Komaeda cried desperately. “You have to realize that's not true.”

Hinata shook his head. It was pointless, trying to talk to him when Komaeda was just going to keep denying it. It wasn't easy to trust someone as suspicious as him. Looking back, he should've realized how strange it was that Komaeda would tell him so many personal things about himself. He was probably just trying to get his sympathy. It sounded like good blackmail material, but Hinata couldn't even prove that any of it was true.

“It's alright,” Hinata said. He came closer and leaned against the pillory, looking down at Komaeda who cautiously looked up at him. “I'm willing to forgive you, you know. I know that things happen. Maybe it _wasn't_ your fault. But there have been other things...”

“I-I know... I'm sorry about that. It's because I'm worthless. You already knew that, though.”

“That sounds like an excuse to me,” Hinata said. He took a finger and tapped it lightly against Komaeda's shoulder. Gradually, he slid that one finger down the center of Komaeda's back, watching with a sense of satisfaction as it drew the kind of shudder from him that he'd been hoping for. “I want you to understand how hopeless you really are. You can't keep getting yourself involved with other people. If you admit that you're trouble, then keep the trouble to yourself.”

He was just messing with him. He wasn't going to hurt him. Komaeda surely realized that he was in a precarious situation where everything hinged on his behavior. Hinata was the one in control. He had a whole cart full of dangerous instruments at his disposal. He wasn't going to use any of the really nasty ones, but Komaeda didn't have to know that. Sensing the potential danger was enough to scare him.

“You're too sensitive – in every way.” Hinata returned his finger to the top of his back and slowly ran it down again, watching as Komaeda squeezed his eyes shut and tried to hold back a noise. “I was the same way. I let other people get to me. I didn't feel like I was special enough, so I hated the way that they treated me. But that's just the way it is. If you aren't special, you have to conform in order to make other people like you.”

“Th-That's not true... You're special in your own ways.”

“Oh?” Hinata stopped for a moment and moved in front of him to look him in the eyes. He was genuinely curious. “You really like me, so you probably know what makes me special. I'll trust you. So? What makes me special?”

Komaeda glanced away. His bottom lip quivered. “You were... nice to me. That made you special to me. That's all you needed.”

Words weren't enough to describe how badly Hinata was annoyed by that.

It sounded so shallow and selfish. Komaeda made it sound like the only thing that made him special was how useful he was to him. Other people existed. Hinata wasn't satisfied with being respected by only one person, especially Komaeda.

Even if they were both on the bottom, he never wanted to admit it. He didn't want to stay on the bottom forever. Komaeda seemed to accept it, and yet he kept trying to be friends with people in the same way that always got him in trouble as if he never learned.

“Thanks,” Hinata said calmly. “I feel like I'm starting to understand you more.”

Komaeda smiled. “That's a relief.”

“You're hopeless for thinking that I'd be happy with that. When we were together, didn't you consider me at all? You're so naïve. People are going to walk all over you unless you change.”

Grabbing the hem of Komaeda's shirt, he pushed it up, exposing his back.

“Wh-... What are you doing?” Komaeda asked. He attempted to struggle again, trying to flex his hands to make them fit through the holes. It was pointless, though. It was too tight around his wrists, and even if he got his hands free, there was no way he could get his head out.

He followed Komaeda's worried gaze to the cart filled with sharp things. Hinata laughed to himself.

He moved behind him and loosely grasped Komaeda by the hips, letting other unpleasant ideas fill his head. His aim wasn't to make Komaeda hate him. It was perfect luck that they'd fallen into a room where he could tease and torment him to his heart's content. After a bit of that, he was sure that Komaeda would be reluctant to come near him or his friends ever again.

From his hips, Hinata moved his hands upward, letting his fingers skirt along the sides of Komaeda's stomach. The way he felt him tense up was perfect. He could tell that he was holding back. For a moment, he removed his hands completely, letting him think that he hadn't noticed.

“I remember how ticklish you are, Komaeda.”

Komaeda went totally silent, but his knees were slightly shaking.

The way he shook was kind of cute. Komaeda had few redeeming features, and it was just unfortunate for him that one of them was how easy he was to tease. Hinata knew what it was like to be picked on, so he couldn't consider himself a bully. He was just having fun, giving Komaeda a bit of attention. It was what Komaeda wanted, after all.

“If you didn't want me to tickle you, you wouldn't have told me about that.”

He brought his fingers back to his sides and moved them around, lightly brushing the tips of his fingers over the sensitive sides of his stomach. As expected, Komaeda stiffened up again and tried not to shout or laugh, but Hinata wasn't going to let him off the hook that time. He kept going until Komaeda was unconsciously pulling at the pillory, until a bunch of giggles burst from his tightly sealed lips.

“Hm? What's this?” Hinata asked. He stopped what he was doing for a moment and pinched Komaeda's sides. “I thought you were really skinny before when we were together. What happened?”

“I... I didn't notice,” Komaeda said, trying to catch his breath.

After he broke up with him, he must have been more disappointed than he let on. He probably tried to ignore how he felt by eating. Although that made Hinata feel a little bad for him, he couldn't help how cute he thought the extra weight looked on him. He liked knowing that it was because of him.

He gave his soft sides a squeeze. Even that much was enough to make Komaeda squirm and groan. “It's okay. That just means that there's more here for me to tickle.”

With that, he started tickling him again, paying attention to the soft, pudgy area right above the waist of his pants. His lower belly seemed to be one of his most sensitive places. When he reached that spot, Komaeda started uncontrollably shaking and the giggles started again. It almost sounded like he was enjoying himself, but Hinata knew what it really had to feel like.

“You're completely helpless right now. If you think I'm going to stop, you're wrong,” he said. As long as he kept watching him, he knew that nothing serious would happen to him. He could tickle him and tickle him, bringing him nearly to the brink of exhaustion before pulling back.

No matter how much Komaeda tried to shift his hips, he couldn't get away. His legs also had to be getting tired, but he was hanging in there.

The more Hinata tickled him, the more interesting his noises became. His cute giggles turned into loud laughs that turned into stuttering, breathless gasps for air. When Hinata got the feeling that he was nearing his limit, he finally removed his hands and took a step away from him.

Komaeda slumped against the metal pillory, his knees pressed together, shoulders sagging.

Hinata went around to look at his face.

“Whoa...”

He hadn't expected him to look that way. His face was a mess; his brow was covered in sweat, his nose was running, and there was drool running down his chin. Exhausted tears rolled down from the corners of his eyes. Apparently Komaeda was even more sensitive than he realized.

“You alright?” Hinata asked.

Komaeda nodded weakly. “Y-Yeah...” he stuttered. He looked a little sick as he sucked in a few breaths to calm and steady himself.

“That's good.” Because he wasn't done with him yet.

Next, he ran two fingers over the inside of one of Komaeda's arms and approached the opening of his sleeve. Komaeda made a noise that sounded like a squeal as Hinata slipped his fingers beneath his sleeve and started lightly tickling under his arm. That was another one of his weak spots, it seemed. Hinata had the feeling it would be. Although Hinata wouldn't have considered himself particularly ticklish, he knew how sensitive that spot was for everyone.

Within seconds, Komaeda was jerking around again, trying to get away. Hinata grabbed him by the shoulder with his other hand to keep him from moving as he worked his fingers back and forth erratically. The sound of his giggles echoed off the torture room walls, sounding louder than the phony screams from elsewhere in the attraction. It wouldn't have been surprising if other people could hear him.

“I bet my friends can hear you,” Hinata teased. “You sound really girly when you laugh this way. How does it feel? Does your stomach hurt from laughing yet? You can't let yourself be that weak. Try to bear with it. If you can't handle this much, how do you expect to put up with anything else? Nobody will respect someone who can't act strong.”

Komaeda closed his jaw and tried not to laugh, but it was impossible. More laughs and gasps burst from his mouth with Hinata's relentless tickling.

“You can do better than that.”

Komaeda tried again. He closed his mouth, but Hinata could still hear the noises in his throat as he struggled to hold them in. As his face started to turn an interesting shade, Hinata let him go.

As soon as Hinata took his hand away, Komaeda gasped. For a few moments, he kept giggling as if he were unable to stop it, and each of his laughs were mixed with pitiful sobs.

“Not bad,” Hinata said. He patted him on the shoulder and Komaeda flinched. “I think you could still use more convincing, though.”

It was hard to believe that they were truly alone. Eventually, someone else was going to reach that area. It couldn't have been an abandoned part of the attraction when the floor was obviously rigged to take them there. The other guys would probably show up at some point. At least, Hinata hoped they would... He hoped they weren't ditching him...

He clicked his tongue.

Whatever. It didn't matter. He was going to enjoy whatever time he had left with Komaeda. He wasn't worried about anyone walking in on them. Technically, they weren't doing anything wrong. As far as he was concerned, he was using the attraction the way it was meant to be used.

He slowly walked behind Komaeda and heard his breathing escalate in anticipation. First, he placed his hands on his exposed back, then slowly slid them around to his front. He felt Komaeda shiver a little, but he did a better job of holding himself together that time. That was good. He was going to make him fall apart.

Spreading out his hands, Hinata got two nice handfuls of his soft tummy and laughed a little just to hear Komaeda groan in embarrassment. He crept the fingers of one hand up his belly and traced his fingers around his bellybutton. Komaeda let out a cry at the light contact, and that cry turned into more helpless laughter as Hinata delved his fingers into the smooth dip of his bellybutton. He swirled his fingers around and used his other hand to loosely tickle his pudgy sides at the same time, enjoying his reactions all the while.

“S- Sto-...! Hina-...! Hinata-kun!” Komaeda stopped talking for a second, all of his words cut off by uncontrollable laughs and sobs. “Please, stop! I can't...! I can't stop laughing! I... I can't brea-...!”

At last, Hinata relented, but he sighed in a way to show Komaeda his disappointment. “I told you to bear with it. Was it really that difficult?”

 

At that point, all of a sudden, the large door on the other side of the room opened up.

In stepped Soda, Tanaka, and Kuzuryu.

 

Soda ran over, laughing his ass off. “Oh man, Hinata! You're sick!”

The other two joined them as well.

“We saw everything,” Tanaka said calmly. “We stayed in the control room upstairs and watched the camera that corresponds with this room.”

“Pretty gross if you ask me,” Kuzuryu muttered. “I wanna get out of here. Let's go.”

Soda grabbed him before he could start walking away. “Wait a second. I wanna try this for myself. It's not every day you get to pretend to be part of a torture flick, you know? This place looks super real. I can't leave before I get a turn.”

“What's the difference?” Kuzuryuu said, shrugging. “I don't know if there's such a thing as 'fake torture' here. At least be honest about it.”

Soda's eyes narrowed, his brows coming together in a scowl. “Are you trying to guilt me? If you want me to be honest, then I'll be honest. This guy deserves it.”

That sounded meaner than Hinata liked. He hadn't intended to get them involved. It was supposed to be between only him and Komaeda. Even the picture on his phone... He planned to keep it to himself. He just wanted to freak him out so he'd start leaving them alone. That way, other people wouldn't bully him.

It was for him. What he did was probably really mean, too, but... He did it for Komaeda's sake, too.

 

Was he just being selfish...?

 

It bothered him to know that the other guys had actually seen them. Thinking about the way he might've looked as he tickled Komaeda made his face turn red. He'd enjoyed himself a lot. He hoped they couldn't tell, but if they wanted to try it too, then they probably understood why he enjoyed it so much.

“Hey, show me what I should do,” Soda said to Hinata.

Keeping his thoughts to himself, Hinata nodded and went over to the cart. He caught the fearful look on Komaeda's face as he returned holding the Wartenberg wheel. Bending down, he made Komaeda lift his heel. The second Komaeda realized what he was doing, he tried to shake his leg out of his grasp, but the other guys grabbed his leg to hold him still, allowing Hinata to remove his shoe and pull his sock off.

As Tanaka and Kuzuryu held Komaeda's leg, Soda made a face.

“Ugh... Seriously? Why can't I just tickle his back or something? I don't want to touch his feet. They're all pale and gross. He's like a zombie.”

Hinata handed him the wheel. “That's what this is for.”

Even though it was useless, Komaeda struggled against the pillory, trying to get their attention. “No way... Guys, you don't have to do this. I'll leave you alone from now on. I won't even look at you. Seriously, just give me a brea-”

He shut up and stopped begging the second Soda ran the wheel down the center of his foot. Instantly, Komaeda let out a loud, startled shout.

“Heh. It's funny to hear you begging,” Soda said. He gave him another roll of the wheel and chuckled as Komaeda whined. “You're always saying weird stuff about how worthless you are, always acting like you deserve the worst. Why bother begging? I bet you love it when people pick on you. That's why you never change.”

That wasn't true. Hinata knew it wasn't like that. Komaeda was just naïve. He kept naïvely hoping that other people would change instead and accept him as he was.

He didn't deserve to be treated that way...

But if they didn't, he was going to let himself get hurt forever. If someone was going to show him, then Hinata wanted to be that person. By treating him that way, he felt like he was also teaching himself a lesson. It might have been mean, but it was a mean sort of kindness.

“Hinata-kun, please... Don't let him...”

It was too late for that. He held Komaeda's hand so he could lead him there for that purpose.

More sad laughs began to slip past his lips as Soda ran the wheel back and forth over the tender center of his foot. His toes curled and flexed, and he still tried to move his leg, but the others firmly held him in place so Soda could continue what he was doing. No amount of struggling was enough to help him get away. Even if he managed to shake his foot out of Soda's grasp, he would have soon been placed right back into the same position. There was nothing he could do about it.

Hinata could see the hopelessness on his face. Despite his laughing, the twisted smile on his face wasn't that of someone who was enjoying themselves. Soda kept going long after the point when Hinata would have personally stopped, letting Komaeda's laughs turn into ragged, hiccuping sobs and gasps for air.

Once Soda was finished tormenting his sole, he moved the wheel between his toes, moving from one to another. Komaeda's eyes rolled back and he started babbling incoherently, probably trying to ask him to stop.

Even though that face was going to get burned into his memory forever, Hinata decided to save it with another picture. When he turned the screen around to let Komaeda see what he looked like, more tears helplessly rolled down his face, embarrassed by how pathetic he looked.

Abruptly, Komaeda stopped laughing and slumped in the pillory, all of his limbs losing their energy.

“Huh?” Soda stopped what he was doing and backed up. “Oh God... D-Don't tell me... Did I kill him? No way...”

“He can't be dead, you idiot,” Kuzuryu muttered, smacking him on the shoulder. “Hinata, you check him.”

As they asked, Hinata checked the side of his neck. He could feel his pulse.

Hinata nodded to them. “He's fine. He just passed out. What do you want to do now?”

Soda grinned. “Let's leave him here. It seems like nobody finds this part of the attraction unless they fall down through that trap door. I bet the odds of that happening are one in a million. It was just that guy's stupid luck that caught you two. Somebody from the park will see him on the cameras and help him eventually. Let's get outta here.”

“I agree,” Kuzuryu said. “He won't be able to follow us now.”

“I'd like to think he would think twice about interacting with us in the future,” Tanaka said, giving Komaeda's limp body a pitying look.

The three of them left first.

Hinata stayed behind to stare at Komaeda for a little longer.

“People like us aren't allowed to get what we want without making sacrifices. I hope you understand that now.”


End file.
